Iruka's Guide to the Care and Feeding of Strays
by morbiDreamscape
Summary: Kakashi is like a stray dog. Iruka can't resist. KakaIru. Oneshot.


Title: Iruka's Guide to the Care and Feeding of Strays

Summary: Kakashi is like a stray dog. Iruka can't resist. KakaIru. Oneshot.

A/N: My muse is a fickle one. Instead of working on Pirate!Fic, or even long-lost Victorian!Fic, it decided to have a 500-lb. plot bunny sumo-smash me in the middle of my long evening commute. Not so much of the plot, but the bunny was gigantic. Six sticky notes filled with cramped handwriting and two traffic-ridden hours later, I parked my car and sat down with my partially written story/notes and knocked the rest out (over the course of the next few days). Shh... I can only write so fast...

Beta'd by Futago no Seishi, who makes everything better! ^_^

~ o ~

The first time Iruka meets Kakashi at the memorial, it is the third anniversary of his parents' death and the Kyuubi attack.

It is pouring rain, and Iruka is shocked to find anyone else there during something so torrential it could almost be categorized as a natural disaster. Not only that, but it looks like the other boy has already been there for a while. His Jounin vest is so wet that the stiff material has begun to lose its shape, and his hair is plastered to his skull, more pewter than silver.

All in all, Kakashi looks like a drowned rat, and even though the other boy has already developed a fearsome reputation, and there is no way that Iruka can fail to identify who exactly stands before him, Iruka can't help the words that come abruptly out of his mouth.

"Do you want to come over to my place to dry off? I live just around the corner..."

Kakashi doesn't even twitch, but Iruka understands. Being in a sacred place for the dead surrounded by ghosts can be all-consuming.

"Take care of yourself," He says gruffly, unused to being anything other than the class troublemaker. However, the world is dark and the sound of the heavens pouring down is loud enough that they can both pretend he hadn't said a thing.

Iruka steps forward and lays a cluster of forget-me-nots on the ground beneath the side of the memorial stone with his parents' names and bows his head. He prays for their happiness in the afterlife as the power of the storm batters and destroys the delicate petals of the tiny blue flowers, scattering them all across the muddy ground.

_Isn't it the thought that counts, though? _He thinks as he walks away.

~ o ~

The second time Iruka meets Kakashi at the memorial, it is two years later. Since it's the weekend and he doesn't have to meet with his genin team, Iruka allows himself to wake up late in hopes that the sun will warm the air up by the time he's ready to go to the memorial. It has been unseasonably cold for October, and Iruka is bundled up tight in coat, scarf and mittens when he shows up at the memorial stone.

Kakashi is standing in the same spot as he was last time, staring intently at the dark glossy stone. Iruka's memory of their last meeting has a distinct clarity that separates it from his other memories of that time. Even though that harsh rain should have blurred the memory like an opaque filter, it acts more like a curtain pulled around their two figures separated by the stone, standing alone yet distant from the rest of the world.

Iruka hesitates only for a moment, foot scuffing against the dirt before he moves closer. He places his forget-me-nots carefully on the base of the memorial stone. He spends a little more time with his parents today, telling them silently about his genin team and how bright and bold Sumire-chan always teases him since she's one year older than him and won't let him forget it. He tells them about Hinoki-kun, who is the quiet one of their group, but is steady and dependable (even though he tends to be a downer at times). He also talks about Maki-sensei, who must have the patience of a saint in order to deal with the three of them five days a week.

Finally, when his fingers and nose are completely numb, he looks up from his parents' names and at the unmoving figure across from him. Kakashi's hair is back to its usual gravity-defying shape, ends waving slightly in the chilly wind. He is dressed in the usual shinobi garb, devoid of any sort of additional clothing that would signify an attempt to compensate for the significant drop in temperature from the norm.

Something about the sight makes Iruka speak up, again. "Would you like to come over for a cup of tea? It's freezing out."

Kakashi's eye flicks over to him. Iruka looks into that wary darkness for several long moments, his hands shoved into his pockets for warmth, before Kakashi turns his gaze back to the memorial.

Iruka understands that he has been dismissed.

"Take care of yourself," Iruka finds himself repeating. Even though he's just a genin, his instincts rarely steer him wrong. They've helped and saved him countless times in his foolish childhood and with his pranks. He's not about to ignore them now. A lightbulb seems to have turned on in his brain.

_Even though he's such an independent, amazing shinobi, he's not very good at taking care of himself,_ Iruka thinks this time as he heads back home.

~ o ~

The third time Iruka meets Kakashi at the memorial, Iruka is a rookie teacher at the Academy, trying his best to stay afloat. After an inauspicious start to his day—waking up late and barely making it to work on time is not how he wants to make a good impression—he had to stay late to correct paperwork and devise lesson plans with Katsura-sensei's infamous "Teacher's Manual That Must Never Be Removed From The Premises!".

Luckily, he had been able to sneak out during his lunch break to buy the usual bunch of forget-me-nots, as he hadn't been able to leave the Academy until well after all the florists closed shop. Having never missed an anniversary and being a firm proponent of tradition, Iruka arrives at the memorial stone closer to midnight than afternoon, and nearly walks into Kakashi in his exhaustion.

"Sorry," He mumbles, setting down his flowers and taking a seat in front of the memorial stone to have a chat with his parents.

He's been so busy for the past few weeks, it's nice to have a quiet moment to tell them about what's new in his life. He wonders what they would think about his decision to become a teacher. Would they be proud or disappointed? His quiet musings are interrupted by the faint but steady sound of something dripping to the ground near him. He looks up, but the night sky is clear of clouds. There's a faint metallic scent in the air though, it smells like...

"Blood!" He says suddenly, looking sharply toward Kakashi.

Now that Iruka's looking more closely at the other man, he realizes that he's slouched more than usual, and has a messily-wrapped bandage around his left shoulder and torso that peek out from under his tattered Jounin vest.

"You should go to the hospital," He says reflexively.

Kakashi turns a poisonous-looking glare at him.

"Okay, okay. How about you come over and I can help you patch yourself up, then? Because if you don't get those bandages fixed soon, you'll pass out and I'll just take you on over to the hospital for some actual treatment."

If looks could kill, Iruka would've probably burned up in the fires of hell by now. However, he's so tired, his common sense has gone into a coma. He's not sure if he can actually haul himself back up, much less get Kakashi back to his apartment, but he's going to damn well try.

He stumbles to his feet and matches Kakashi's look with a stern one of his own, pretending Kakashi is one of the most recalcitrant kids in his class. Surprisingly, the other man looks away first, taking a tiny step forward. Hoping he's reading Kakashi correctly, Iruka turns to lead the way back to his place.

As Iruka has mentioned before, his apartment really _is_ right around the corner, just beyond the stand of trees that divide the memorial stone and the training ground beyond from the rest of Konoha. Unfortunately, it's also on the second floor (Iruka refused any ground-floor apartments when he first moved in, just because it was completely against every shinobi code there was). However, Kakashi makes it up without incident.

Iruka presses one hand against the door as he turns the key in the lock. A slight ripple in chakra is all that denotes his wards deactivating from his touch. Iruka can sense Kakashi's chakra expanding slightly outwards to briefly brush against the wards, which bounce the foreign chakra back briefly before they settle down and let them both in.

Once inside, he heads straight for his first-aid kit, which he keeps in the kitchen. Kakashi lingers near the front door until Iruka points over to the solitary kitchen bar stool. Iruka should probably be depressed about how his lack of furniture reflects his lack of friends invited into his space, but really, there's a bleeding guy in his kitchen and he needs to find out how severe the damage is before he can plan his next move. If it's a matter of life and death, he'll _find_ a way to get Kakashi there...somehow.

Kakashi perches on the stool after removing his vest and dropping it on the ground near his feet, strangely docile, although his body is stiff with tension and obvious unease. Iruka decides to continue to treat him like a skittish child in his class, opting to ignore the behavior to allow him to become comfortable at his own pace.

"I'm going to take off the bandages now, is that okay?"

Kakashi nods slightly.

The bandages have loosened to the point that it only takes a light touch for Iruka to unravel them. Even so, Kakashi flinches slightly, more at his touch than the sensation of the bandages pulling away from his skin, tacky and stiff with dried blood. Revealed, the wound turns out to be fairly deep slashes going from the top of his shoulder diagonally to the center of his back. Parts of the wound have reopened and started bleeding again. Although for anyone else, it would have been a hospital-worthy injury, it isn't life-threatening, and Iruka knows that he isn't going to fight this battle today.

"You'll live," He says in response to Kakashi's raised brow.

After cutting off the remains of Kakashi's shirt and cleaning off the wound—he isn't sure he wants to know how strong of an opponent Kakashi had been fighting to receive such a serious injury even through the thick protective material of his vest—Iruka puts firm pressure on the opened cuts to stop the bleeding. He applies a thick layer of antibiotic ointment, then makes a few quick stitches in the deepest areas. He seals the rest with countless butterfly bandages to hold the edges of Kakashi's skin together. His first attempts are rather clumsy, but soon his repetitive actions gain an efficiency and neatness that can only be attained through practice.

Throughout the entire process, Kakashi doesn't make a sound, although Iruka's brief attempt to do a bit of minor chakra healing to help the muscles knit together properly nearly sends Kakashi flying off the stool, so sensitive he is to unfamiliar chakra being used on him.

When Iruka is finally finished, he can barely keep his eyes open. He goes to wash his hands in the kitchen sink, and when he turns back, Kakashi is gone, a small swirl of leaves and a blood-splattered floor the only sign that he had been there at all.

Iruka just blinks and discards his dirty clothes right on the kitchen floor with the other mess, walking naked into his room and climbing into bed. He's asleep before his head even hits the pillow.

The next day after work, Iruka finds a small packet of rare tea from Snow Country sitting precisely in the center of his kitchen counter.

~ o ~

The fourth time Iruka meets Kakashi at the memorial, it's not the anniversary of the Kyuubi attack. In fact, it's only three weeks after the Tea Incident, when Iruka cursed Kakashi's terrible propensity for genius in breaching the wards that took him so long to construct, all the while looking down at the unassuming packet with a pleased smile on his face.

Iruka gets to the memorial site long before classes start for the day, when the mist is still hovering over the grass and twining around the trees, filtering out the weak early morning light. He's there to look for something a student dropped the previous day when they took a class trip to learn about the men and women who lost their lives for Konoha.

As soon as he breaches the trees, he spots the hazy outline of a figure standing at the memorial stone. Somehow, before he even gets close enough to see that ridiculous fluffy hair, he knows it's Kakashi. And like another lightbulb going off, he wonders how he had never realized that to the other man, it was never about the tradition of anniversaries. He probably should've felt stupid for taking so long to figure it out, but it finally clicks that Kakashi comes here every single day.

He comes to a stop a few yards away and waits respectfully for Kakashi to look over at him before asking, "How's your injury doing?"

Kakashi eyes him silently for a moment before stretching his left arm up over his head, rotating it back and around without any sign of pain to show his range of motion and overall improvement.

Iruka smiles and adds, "Thank you for the tea."

Kakashi nods.

"Would you like to have a cup with me? I have some time before work..."

Kakashi seems to take a moment to think about the offer before he nods again. As they walk back together, the rising sun slowly evaporating the fog, Iruka spots a small glint coming from under the tall grass. He leans forward, plucking the battered pocket watch from the ground and slides it into his vest pocket.

They travel in companionable silence back to Iruka's apartment building, up the stairs that Iruka had to basically pour chemicals down to get rid of the blood stains (how was he going to explain a trail of blood leading to his front door to his apartment manager?) and back inside. This time, Iruka's got a different warding system that hopefully will take longer for Kakashi to break through. From the slight glint in Kakashi's eye as he passes through the doorway, Iruka knows that Kakashi has accepted the challenge.

Honestly, Iruka can only imagine the practice he'll get if they keep this up.

He takes out the unopened package of tea from his kitchen cabinet. At Kakashi's Look, he blushes faintly and scratches the back of his head. "What? I was saving it for a rainy day..."

The tea tastes absolutely delicious.

Later, as the two shinobi go their separate ways, two slightly chipped tea cups sit together in Iruka's kitchen sink.

~ o ~

The fifth time Iruka meets Kakashi at the memorial, it's early evening and the sun is just starting to set. By now, Iruka's learned how to balance work and his personal life, even though rookie teachers are now coming to _him_ for help with lesson plans after school.

Kakashi is standing in the same place as always, but he looks up when Iruka moves close and presses a gentle kiss to his masked lips.

"Welcome home," Iruka murmurs, before resting his bundle of blue flowers at the base of the memorial stone.

They speak to their loved ones in silence for a while, and afterward, they go out for drinks with a group of their friends. Countless drinks later, the subject of how they first met somehow comes up.

"Iruka kept trying to lure me to his place," Kakashi says gleefully. He doesn't mention anything about the memorial stone. "I felt my purity was in danger!"

"What purity," Iruka scoffs. Iruka doesn't either. No matter how much they trust their friends with their lives, some things are private.

"I'm hurt!" Kakashi shoots back, giving him a puppy-eyed look.

"You'll live," Iruka replies, and they share a secret smile.


End file.
